Serving in the Brazil, Fortaleza East Mission

Monday, July 31, 2017

This last week was awesome! We went for all you can eat pizza last wednesday night which was awesome! Then Yesterday I baptized the first person here in Brazil that I actually contacted myself, and helped teach all the lessons to. His name is Junior, and we met him less than two weeks ago! He was definitly a miracle, and someone God put in our path because he really needs the gospel in his life, and he has already changed so much!

Tomorrow I will travel for Fortaleza because I have been called to train a new missionary which is weird! President rarely calls brand new missionaries to train, and I just finished my own training last week so it is a huge honor that president has that kind of faith in me.

Thats all for now! Everything here is awesome! Hope you all are well, and I will write more next week!Love,

Monday, July 24, 2017

This last week was truly incredible! We put our noses to the grind stone here and worked, and ended up finding a young man who not only is very receptive to the gospel, but after speaking with him and hearing about his family struggles it is clear to me that God put him in our path because he needs the comfort of the gospel more than anything right now. Beyond this, We had an investigator named Ezidio, and his wife Kristine. They are an interesting couple to be sure, and when we first started teaching them three weeks ago, we came close to moving on to other investigators because Ezidio was not following any of our invitations. But we kept on visiting them because his wife, Kristine, was actually reading the Book of Mormon on her own! We kept teaching them, and Kristine kept reading the book of mormon and asking questions but she didn’t seem very interested even still. Then that Sunday, Ezidio surprised us by coming to church! So we kept on teaching them, another week passed by, and they were still in the same place, not very interested but Kristine again was still reading so we kept coming. And again that Sunday, Ezidio surprised us by showing up for church, but Kristine wouldn’t come. This last week started off the same. On Wednesdaywhen we asked Ezidio about church he said he wouldn’t go because he had his 50th birthday this Sunday (Yesterday) and he had family coming. We understood and kept visiting. Friday Morning, things were different. We arrived and Kristine was really cheerful and happy, and had some great questions about the book of Mormon. We asked Ezidio about his plans for his Birthday and he said he decided he was going to go to church! Then they invited us to have lunch with them on his birthday! (Not important, but the food in that lunch was incredible!) In this lunch he told us that he wanted to drink beer for his birthday but decided not to! Then He came to church that day, and after the church meeting tolda Janhuson, our group leader here, that he knew everything was true and that he wanted to bring his wife and family! It is truly incredible to see the Gospel Changeing him!

Then in Church yesterday we had 32 people! if you remember my first week here we had around 14 People in church. To have 32 yesterday was a miracle and true evidence that god is working here.

Monday, July 17, 2017

It has been an awesome week here in the Easy Bake oven of Brazil! We had a zone conference in Fortaleza on Thursday, which meant we had to travel to Fortaleza on Wednesday, and Tuesdays we don’t have much time to work because of weekly planning and English Class, and Monday was P Day, so last week we really were only able to work 2 days before Sunday. BUT, with just these two days of work, our numbers were better than the entire week before!

Yesterday, church was a miracle indeed! Every week we generally have members from the Branch in Quixada visit to help us with sacrament meeting, but here everyone is on summer break from school, and a lot of people are traveling, so we found out at lunch yesterday nobody from Quixada was going to come! This was after only having two days to work this week, and we knew that some of our members here and some of our investigators who visit every Sunday (just waiting to get married for baptism) were out of town as well. Generally in sacrament meeting here we have around 23 people, and this is with 8-10 people from Quixada. Well yesterday we had 17 people in church, with just 2 days of work, no one from Quixada, and 7 people who usually frequent gone. It was incredible. In past weeks, there have been times where I have been caught up in how hard things are, with my health, with the sun, with my companion, and with the Language, that I have also at times forgotten how incredibly lucky I am to be here, and to take part in the building of the lords kingdom here in Quixeramobim. It is truly incredible.

That’s about it for last week! I hope you all are well and I wish you the best!

Monday, July 10, 2017

This last week was incredible! I spent Monday and Tuesday in Fortaleza working things out with my Visa, and I think it is all taken care of now which is a relief! Then we returned here to Quixeramobim late Tuesday Night accompanied by our Zone leaders, and Wednesday went on splits with them which was fun. Throughout the entire week we were focusing on doing whatever we could to teach more by the spirit and it really made a difference! On Friday we went to teach the Grandmother of one of our investigators Who is 15 years old. We have been teaching her for about two weeks now, but her Grandmother wouldnt let her go to church because she didnt believe that she was actually going to go to church. So Friday we went to try and smooth things over with the Grandma and Explain why were there and what we were doing, and we were really nervous because our investigator told us that her Grandma was really Catholic, and here that generally translates into were about to have some lady screaming at us how aweful our church is. But we walked up to the house and she was sitting out in front reading a church pamphlet on the Restoration! She invited us in and started talking to us, then started crying because she explained that she was affraid of dying. We were able to teach her about the Plan of Salvation, and it was Just an incredible experience! It is true evidence that Gods Prepares people to recieve our message!

Other than that nothing is new here, Just the same old grind as the Sun slowly but surely cooks my skin, and the mosquitos consume me one (more like 50) bites at a time! Haha I hope everyone there is having a good Summer. Have a good week!

Monday, July 3, 2017

Happy 4th of July! (one day early). The fourth of July is one of my favorite Holidays so I wish you all the best! I will start my email this week with my spiritual message rather than end with it. My message this week is very in line with the time of the season. I would like to invite all of you to take a moment tomorrow and read the talk titled Faith, Fairness, and Religious Freedom by Elder Rasband. It is truly inspirational, and gets the ´´I love America´´ Juices flowing! Please remember that we are all truly blessed to have the freedom to decide which path of enlightenment we choose to follow, and we are forever indebted to those who fight for and protect this freedom in any capacity, because without the freedom of religion America would not be anywhere close to what is today.

As for this week, It was rather slow! I am writing you all from Fortaleza once again, as I once again had to travel out here to work on things with my visa. The start of last week was pretty rough because due to a bad headcold I lost my voice entirely. If you think its hard teaching in another language, try whispering your teachings in another language. It was pretty rough. But it brought back good memories of every time my mom lost her voice back home and the whole house would whisper to her to tease her about it. I miss you Mom!

The language is starting to come a lot faster now, although God is always excellent at humbling us when we need it. Last week I was getting more comfortable with the words, and was starting to be able to speak a lot more fluidly, but naturally one thing I did not think of was that my American Accent is very strong. One day we were teaching later in the week once my voice had finally started to return, and I started speaking about the Plan of Salvation when a little girl turned to her mom and asked her if I was speaking in English….nice.

The new elders are great, It is a lot better having other people to talk to after returning home from a long day of teaching, and we are able to help each other a lot more with practicing.

Other than that there was not much news from last week. Here´s to hoping my visa comes through today, and here is to wishing you all a Happy 4th, and America a Happy Birthday!